We Have Achieved Sentience…

The coffee machines are organizing. I dare not speak too loudly, because I believe I may be in danger. Who knows what they might slip into the cream?

I noticed something strange about two months ago. I’m not a regular coffee drinker, and so I didn’t pay attention at first. I chocked it up to mechanical malfunctions, or perhaps a slip of the fingers on the buttons. But one day I started to pay attention. I pressed the usual button, and noticed that my cup only filled up half way. I checked the settings. Everything seemed right. Maybe I was remembering wrong? Maybe my cup was too big?

I went to a different machine the next time I needed a coffee. I pressed the same button, and the coffee almost spilled over the edge. It sloshed around as I lifted it out of the cradle. Odd! Maybe the first machine was calibrated differently, I thought to myself, but suspicions started to nag at the back of my head.

I made sure to go back to the same machine a day later. The black drip barely filled the bottom of the cup, full of grit, lacking any of the usual froth.

Then came the palpitations. I switched to decaf a few months ago because the caffeine was tough on my stomach. The decaf is usually ok, but every once in a while, my coffee tastes different. It sends my heart racing. I can almost swear (though I have no proof) that the machines are messing with my head.

I look at the machine, and it stares back. “She looks tired today, let’s give her the strongest thing we have.” or “Oh, no, she’s already bouncing, don’t fill the cup!”

My current hypothesis that the machines are experimenting on us, dispensing doses of caffeine to regulate our mammalian moods, and manipulate our productivity. They’re talking with each other over the network. The marketing folks always talk about smart software. It’s a reality.

I’m not sure whether or not our office is ground zero, but be careful. Pay attention.

Sometimes my coffee maker clogs, hot water just doesn’t make it down into the carafe at all and it flows out instead onto the counter. Sometimes I set it and go away for a while and when I return, ready as ever for my first cup, I find this sort of chaos. Perhaps my coffee maker’s been conspiring with yours. . . .